DELAWARE COUNTY, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) — A Delaware County man is facing multiple charges after police say he tried to poison his neighbor’s dogs.
Police Chief Brandon Graeff said the department had received complaints for months from Mark Nugent, 63, of Broomall.
“About dogs being outside, barking incessantly, sometimes at later hours, sometimes just during the day, but incessantly,” he said.
Graeff said those calls were taken very seriously and reported to their animal warden.
“Just like with anything, there’s a process, and sometimes those processes don’t work fast enough for some people, and frustrations build,” he explained.
Graeff said that’s when Nugent decided to take matters into his own hands.
“The suspect that we allege to be Mr. Nugent was captured on video from the victim's home. We allege that he had thrown raw meat balled up to look like a meatball with rat poison pellets stuffed inside, numerous ones of those,” he said.
He said the homeowner’s daughter noticed the dogs pick something up in the yard and was able to get it out of their mouths before they consumed it.
Graeff noted that weeks prior to that incident, the victim had found hundreds of pieces of chocolate in his yard — a candy known to be toxic to dogs.
Nugent faces multiple charges, including the third-degree felony of aggravated cruelty to animals. That can carry up to seven years in prison.